Email from Monday, January 5, 2015
Hello Family and Friends!
This week flew by but I still feel like I haven´t talked to you guys all year! ;)
What
a rollercoaster of emotions this week was! Every day was filled with
awesome awesome moments and then followed up by some of the hardest
moments I´ve had so far. But I learned so much! I cannot believe it´s
already my last full week with Hna Lyon. I am so sad but I know she´s
gonna be an awesome member missionary still when she gets home...Jan 16 :( But oh well, change is a huge part of the mission so I just gotta roll with it!
Some #justboliviathings for this week
- not sure why but fruitcakes rule Bolivia during this time of year and every time I´m offered it, I turn into the grinch when he´s at that holiday hubee-whatee being force-fed fruitcake
- nye is like having all of the giant firework shows in northern California happen in your neighborhood. it starts at midnight and people legit party all night long....which is not so awesome for a sister missionary determined to get some sleep! but we went to the roof and watched at midnight and it was way cool
- downside is that after nye you can still buy fireworks at all the ventas and there's no age limit so all week we´ve just seen little kids with lighters blowing off fireworks at night and SOMEONE THREW A FIREWORK AT US! Like one of those little ones people do in their front yards that just pop really loud but still...I thought I entered a war zone and was hit by a grenade...it was pretty sketch. darn niños...
- alcohol...............the entire town was shut down this week because everyone was drunk and/or hungover from Wednesday to Friday. It was embarrassing and disgusting and just sad.
But
on a positive note, we have awesome, awesome investigators right now
and this week I really learned about and saw the difference in people
who have been prepared by the Lord to receive the gospel at this time in
their life. We have Mariluz who has breast cancer and made a promise
with the Lord that if she lived, she would always share her knowledge of
God and His miracles so she´s already an awesome missionary, we´re just
helping her learn the truth so she can share it. She´s so great and we
just hope her husband can start meeting with us too so her whole family
can be blessed. Maria Fernanda is the most adorable lady ever. She´s 23
and she has a little daughter but she´s so eager to learn about the
gospel and a lot of her family members are members of the church so
they´re totally supporting her in this decision. They´re both working
towards getting baptized at the end of the month.
One
experience I had this week that I really want to share with you guys is
an experience that we had with a couple we have been teaching for a
while. We showed up this week for an appt and brought a Book of Mormon
to give them. But when we showed up, the wife met us at the door and
said we couldn´t meet with them anymore because they didn´t like our
message and didn´t want us near them. When we asked why, the husband
came out and the two of them pretty much ranted on about all these lies
and myths and stories they had read on the internet about our church and
the Book of Mormon. We tried addressing their concerns and refuting and
explaining that they were wrong but it was very very clear that they
had closed their minds and hearts on the topic. So Hna. Lyon and I stood
there on their doorstep, with tears in our eyes, with shaking voices,
and with the spirit in our hearts and we bore our simple and sincere
testimonies of the Book of Mormon and our love of the restored gospel of
Jesus Christ and His true church on the earth today and then we invited
them to ask God and then walked away with our arms around each other,
confident that the Book of Mormon IS the word of God, that it testifies
of Jesus Christ as our Savior and Redeemer, that it contains the fulness
of His gospel. I know that with all my heart because I have read it. I
have asked God in faith and I have felt the power of God, the Holy
Ghost, confirm to me. If you have not read the Book of Mormon or are
unsure of it´s truthfulness, I invite you to read it, to ask your
Heavenly Father, and know for yourself.
I love
being a missionary. I love the difficult times when we get yelled at in
quechua or have 6 dogs barking during the entire lesson because those
times come with the great times when we have companionship study and
have the spirit work in both of us to help one another or when we watch
someone completely change their lives as they come to know and
understand gospel truths. This is a message of change. I testify that
because of Christ´s Atonement, we can change, we can be better. To all
of you who set goals for the new year, stick to them! You can change. I
love this work, His work, and I´m grateful every day to be a part of
it.
One of my goals is to work on humility by
keeping a gratitude journal each day. It will help me realize how much
I´ve been blessed by someone who knows so much more than I do.
I
hope you guys are all doing something each day to become more like
Jesus Christ and feel His spirit in your lives. I love you all! :)
Con mucho amor,
Hermana Gauger
We visited the Plaza in the center of Santa Cruz last P-Day. It´s only
15 minutes away by taxi and it´s so cool! I felt like I was back on my
trip to Mexico! I bought the cutest little nativity made out of salt
because there´s salt flats in bolivia and another little one in a part
of a tree. my first recuerdos!
At midnight on NYE, they had INSANE fireworks and we went on the roof and watched em.
We made pasta because we had to be in at 8 on nye
We made french toast on new years day and had hot chocolate the
other day because it was FREEZING! I had to wear gloves when we went out
to our lessons.
I made MASACO in a tree!! It´s smashed bananas with cheese. It´s actually
not too bad but it´s a lot harder to make than it looks!
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